Sometimes, they do come back. Loyal readers of The Bridle Paths might remember how, in October of last year, I came across the teaser trailer for a strangely familiar-looking horse game, named Spirit Horse Simulator. In my article, I made no mystery out of my befuddlement for such a brazen copyright infrangement—from the suspicious timing of the name change, to the tiny Spirit copycat, to the infamous Little Crack. Still, I reserved to amend my opining upon trying the game; however, October came and went, with no Demo in sight. With no indication that the game would ever actually come out of limbo, I shifted my focus elsewhere, and nearly forgot about the whole thing… until now.
That’s right. On May 6th, the first playable Demo for Storm Horse Simulator was released, together with a brand-new trailer, logo and, I assume, updated AI cover. With my finals now over, I decided it was time to see if my initial reservations were correct, or if I owed Indie Forge some apologies. After all, it’s not like we’re talking about a game built on the premises of larger, much more successful franchise, right? So, what could go wrong?
Spoiler alert: a lot.
STORM HORSE SIMULATOR: BACK TO THE FIELDS WE GO
The Demo starts out exactly as shown in the preview. Our protagonist, a little buckskin colt, wakes up in a fenced field, despite allegedly being a wild horse. We soon meet with our father, who instructs us on how to fight, survive and recruit horses for the herd. It’s here that we get a good first look at animations and gameplay. Storm’s moveset is fairly straightforward: you move with WASD, jump with Space and sprint by holding the Shift key. Our colt can also defend himself from danger by kicking and rearing, creating literal shockwaves on the ground. Then there’s the pole, which we can evade by spamming the spacebar until we break free.
The controls are responsive and the visuals, while dated, are not atrocious either. The day and night cycle can create some nice views, especially at sunset. At this stage, the problem rests with its character models and animations. Storm is a spindly-legged colt, with big, bulging eyes and a ‘roach back’ that shows up when he runs or jumps. On the other hand (hoof?), his mentor Amadeus features a much more realistic appearance—which comes off even more off-putting once we meet our first proper ‘herdmate’. The black stallion looks completely out of place, and his awkward dialogue is definitely not helping his cause all that much.
You can’t tell me that Storm, Amadeus and Temu Maximus aren’t from three different games.
Storm Horse Simulator © Indie Forge Studios
LIFE IN THE WILD
As Amadeus tells us time and time again, our job as the leader is to keep the herd safe. This includes earning the trust of our fellow brethren through negotiation and find the best places to eat, drink and rest. The concept is very interesting in practice, but quickly loses much of its edge after a few minutes. The few horses that we rescue trust us pretty much immediately after completing their quests—and what little personality they display, vanishes just as quickly. The most we can do in terms of herd management is set a new safe spot, preferably near a stream and a bush of wild berries. Taking a nap in the hay will replenish your Health and speed time forward a few hours, as well as serve as spawn points in case of an untimely death.
Keep in mind this last part, it will become relevant later.
The empty sections of the Herd menu suggest there may be further command options yet to come.
Horse interactions are, at least for now, pretty lacklustre.
Storm Horse Simulator © Indie Forge Studios
THE JOURNEY BEGINS
After getting the basics down, we are treated to an unceremonious time skip, where Storm finally ages up to an adult… and also turns chestnut for no reason at all. After meeting the ghost of our father, we are dispatched to a nearby field to befriend a horse named Maximilianus. From him we learn that another horse, named Felix, is held captive in the village of Eldergate; and, like any good leader, we must go and find him.
Felix’s rescue marks the first time we come face to face with the humans Amadeus warned us about, and for good reason. Remember what I said about untimely death? Well, simply existing in the line of sight of a patrolling NPC will cause bullets to rain on our hide like a 5-Star Wanted level, and it will only take four or five direct hits to wake up in our chosen spawn point. To make matters worse, said bullets are pretty much invisible, and you might even confuse them with a gust of wind. If you hear shooting, your best bet is to turn tail and run in the opposite direction.
I swear, the jumping out of the paddock only to end up right in the line of fire was an accident.
They should really do something for the brightness, though…
Storm Horse Simulator © Indie Forge Studios
PUT THE CART BEHIND THE (WILD) HORSE
From this point on, humans will take the lion’s share of the narrative. Felix will lead us to an Old Man (referred exclusively as such), whom we will help to gather hay from the fields. It’s possibly the most baffling scene in the game, simply for establishing so many absurd things all at once. For starters, Storm can talk to the humans—and the humans understand him back. Then comes the hilarious mismatch between the Old Man’s character model and its dialogue icon. And finally we, a wild horse whose first encounter with humans almost ended in death by gunfire, allow ourselves to be hitched to a cart and driven around—by a Little Creek look-alike, no less.
The final scenes have us meet up with a man named Ahuli, whose only difference from the Old Man’s stable hand is the lack of necklace. After delivering some medicine, we fall into a trap set by a mysterious Colonel, who recognizes us as the son of Amadeus and tries to tame us by force. If we can buck him off, soldiers will open fire on us. Our only hope is to let Ahuli get on our back and run to the edge of the forest, where the demo abruptly ends… or does it?
So many questions. So little answers.
Storm Horse Simulator © Indie Forge Studios
No, actually. Press ‘Play’ again and you will find that some new side activities are suddenly available. Highlights include helping a suspicious-looking bandit recover his bag from (and likely making us accomplices of a robbery in the process), finding three flowers and delivering wood. I’ll repeat it once again. We, a wild horse, are now a communal beast of burden.
Oh, and our name is now Spirit. Because of course it is.
A MEANDERING OF CIRCUMSTANCES
There’s no doubt in my mind that Storm Horse Simulator was born to be a rip-off. From our father waxing poetics about running free with the wind, to finding out that not all humans are cruel, all the way to helping a clear Native American-coded character escape an unnamed Colonel, the blueprint informing the demo couldn’t be any clearer. And yet, that’s not my biggest gripe with this game. That was my expectation when I began playing, and that expectation was met. No, what I find most offensive about the whole thing is the complete failure to take one of the most beloved staples of Horse Girl culture and do anything even remotely interesting with it.
A WRINKLE IN TIME/S
Let’s start with the world. While some screenshots are copy-pasted straight from the canyon chase scene (you know which one), our starting zone looks much more like your run-of-the-mill medieval european fantasy, albeit with several twists. The villages of Eldergate, Pinebarrow and Briarhearth feature distinctly Tudor houses, mixed with victorian iron laces on the rooftops. The men patrolling the streets wield 16th century’s muskets, while our working harness might as well have come out of Black Beauty. And then we have the Ahuli and the Colonel, whose design makes him look more like an edgy, morally grey antagonist turned love interest in an AI-generated novel rather than a character in his own right.
The first exchange is so funny to me. Like, buddy, the water was literally behind you!
Also, I’m 99% sure that horse limbs are not supposed to do that.
Storm Horse Simulator © Indie Forge Studios
Other screenshots on the official Steam page show a railway, people fighting with lance and spears, and a whole Native American camp. However, there’s no weight behind any of these settings. They exist because they must, even though the clumsy rebrand of the game desperately wants to prove that it’s a completely different concept. Spirit saves a Native boy, so there goes Ahuli. Instead of a cavalry fort, the Colonel gets a fortress. And then, our heroes escape into the wilderness, which is little more than a backyard. A fenced one, might I add.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Storm Horse Simulator is a deeply flawed and misguided experience. Every good bit of gameplay, like the herd managing mechanics, is paper-thin and barebone and, at any rate, largely unimportant for the story. The narrative is rushed and disjointed, taking up the tropes of the original Spirit without adding anything of substance to it. The corny dialogue and emotionless voice acting become grating after just a few minutes. Our supposed “call of the wild” soon turns into an illogical mess with no thought, build-up or emotional payoff—a far cry from the emotional journey of the Spirit Who Could Not Be Broken.
If I had to save one thing about this demo, it would be the soundtrack. Several areas have their own theme, and the celtic strings are overall pretty nice to listen to—save for a couple of times where the music either drowns the dialogue, or doesn’t play at all. Pity that the main menu features a near-identical chord progression to ‘Homeland’…
Storm Horse Simulator © Indie Forge Studios
The demo for Storm Horse Simulator is available on Steam. While slated for 2026, we currently have no set release date.
